Your Wings Were Never Mesmerizing to Me: On Why Drunk People With Cameras Are Boring

Embodiment, mystery, cleaning, and nail polish removal. If my day was a teeter-totter, it would be at the exact moment of balance: Satisfying, but with the warm tension and curiosity toward the next lean of life dropping you into the next dip, or pulling a gasp out of your mouth and clutch out of your hands at the next rise. 

This week there was a well-timed reunion with a person who has been in my life in some capacity for 18 years. I've never quite been able to put my finger on why and how he feels familiar well beyond the 18 years we've actually known each other but, no matter. I enjoy the ease in which we share humor and ideas and suspicions and life.  

 

be well; be loved,

k. 

 

Currently reading: My Lover, the Rabbi by Wayne Koestenbaum

Recently watched: The Letter Room, a short by Elvira Lind that (surprisingly) had Alia Shawkat in it.  

[image credit: Le Génie du Mal by Joseph Geefs, 1842 (left); Le Génie du Mal by Guillaume Geefs, 1848 (right) Source: Basler Zeitung]

The Stock of Your Greeting Cards

Lately I have been back at listening to different Hz of sound for various outcomes. Today, I have been listening to 40 Hz binaural beats geared towards focus. What results is a feeling of being in a different dimension. Not a better one nor a worse one - just one that feels markedly different. 

[I pause here to mention that I read recently that 18.98 Hz is said to cause hallucinations of "ghosts" in humans because it somehow vibrates the eyeball or the fluid within it. I have no interest in testing the theory, mainly because much of what I've read also says that it causes a feeling of dread as well. What has this level of sound? An extractor fan, evidently. Well, and the Youtube videos now made to replicate it.]

*

I spent a good part of today with a friend of mine and her brother. I asked them questions about what they were like growing up and how their relationship to each other has evolved. It was fun to learn about a loved one through the eyes of their sibling. I studied the similar shape of their eyes as they spoke and looked at each other.

* 

I've recently tried my hand at investigating Macbeth, again. Word on the theatrical street is that Akira Kurosawa's Throne of Blood (1957) is the best filmed adaptation of it - setting it in feudal Japan. It is on the docket. 

In the meantime, if you haven't gone to see Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, I highly recommend it. I will keep this from being a film review. All you'd need to do is look up Jane Schoenbrun and it will prepare you for the dreamy, genderless meditations on being and attraction and becoming that they tend to make. The films create a feeling of an ineffable moment: Something that feels groundbreaking but simultaneously deeply familiar in the way that a long-forgotten dream resurfacing does. 

 

 

be well; be loved,

k. 

 

[image by Mohammad Alizade]

The Company You Hired to Clean Up the Mess

 

 

This weekend X and I went on our secret little biannual routine that I won't mention but that ends with Thai food and driving fast cars that I will mention. I won't lie: A Rivian goes fucking FAST if it wants to. 0-60 in less than 3 seconds. Total asshole/pussy clencher and don't act like you don't know what I'm talking about. 

It was a good time, as always.

 (pause)

A bit ago, Petty Officer and I hosted some friends to come over before going to an art show and I have to say that I am slowly breaking my habit of cultivating the home of a 13-year-old boy. No one sat on milk crates, I had enough glasses for everyone there, and I had napkins of sorts as opposed to what I refer to as a "slob blanket" which is a shower-sized towel that you can put on your lap and wipe your hands on as you eat before throwing it in the washer. (In defense of the slob blanket: Not only is it environmentally friendly, but I will have you know that I've had more than a few people pick up on the habit.)

What can I say? 

A long time ago I heard a binary stereotype: Women keep their rooms spectacularly clean yet their cars looking like an actual trashcan on wheels; men meticulously detail their cars yet have their mattresses held up on cinder blocks. 

While my gender(s) don't fit exactly into this framework, I will say only that my car is almost obsessively clean yet I do not own cinder blocks. 

I will be taking no questions at this time.

 

Be well, be loved,

 

k.  

 

 

 [image credit: Hoyoun Lee via Unsplash]

 

 

The Phrase You Remember Most That Was Whispered into Your Ear

 

I speak and understand and read four languages including my own [...] I suppose that's why I have a tendency (as does Luisa, who is also an interpreter) [...] to want to understand everything that people say and everything I hear, both at work and outside, even at a distance, even if it's one of the innumerable languages I don't know, even if it's in an indistinguishable murmur or an imperceptive whisper, even if it would be better that I didn't understand and what's said is not intended for my ears, or is said precisely so that I won't catch it.

                       - From A Heart So White by Javier Marías                                                          

Recently, I watched a film short about two interpreters and have been thinking about it. The two main characters are simultaneous interpreters, the kind in which people who need the spoken language access (in this case, Hungarian) are given earphones in which to hear the  interpretation while a speaker is presenting. 

I've been around this type of interpreting and these types of earpieces a number of times. I've sat next to people using them. I've been one of the people using them. The flimsy and ill-fitting plastic-and-sometimes-foam meant to offer access to information for the price of discomfort for a few hours. The most memorable time being around these earpieces was, long ago, being in a room with Baltasar Garzón lecturing in his tailored suit and slicked back silver and dark gray hair. I recall how he gripped the emblemed, fake-wood podium at times. I remember this movement accentuating his sophisticated, almost teasing tie wear as he spoke. 

More specifically this film short taught me the term chuchotage, which I have also been in a room with and been teased by. Chuchotage is another type of simultaneous interpretation, one in which the interpreter stands (or sits) close to a person and whispers the translation in real time. There is a connection to the French verb chuchoter in its origins which means "to whisper". It tends to only be functional when there are one to maybe four people needing access to a particular language. I've been in a lot of meetings where chuchotage is going on in the back or side of the room and, before realizing that's what was happening, I thought people were just whispering during a presentation, which peaked my interest. 

I wonder, from a spoken language interpreter's perspective on simultaneous interpretation, if most prefer being the disembodied voice in the ears of a percentage of the crowd, or if most prefer to sit close and whisper. 

From a physical and interpreting standpoint, I have thoughts. There are pros and cons to them both that I can see. From my own experience interpreting, I can say that sometimes chuchotage makes my own interpreting more challenging in that it becomes harder to hear what is being said by the speaker. But I don't fault anyone for that: Access is access and it's all equally vital. 

Putting all profession aside: I will forever be prone to romanticize any type of whispered access that is murmuring in the back of the room and tempting me for my attention.

 

 

Be well; be loved,

 

k.

Note: The aforementioned film short is by Barnabás Toth and is entitled Chuchotage (2018).

 

[photo credit: Kristina Flour]